Friday, April 24, 2015

Zach has been squirreling away magic cards for a while
now so that we could have a card house event.
Basically, we take 15 pounds of cards, use them to build a card castle,
and then we take rubber bands to knock them down. You know, you're typical Tuesday night.

Kelly: Why aren't we watching House of Cards right now?

Me: You're killing me.

Matty: Killing me softly.

Tristan: How many are you bending?

Zach: As many as I can.

Tristan: Why don't you drive it over with your Prius?

At the end of the night... Matty, "Thanks for
inviting me. It's been MAGICal.

I took a lot of pictures throughout the process just in
case they didn’t make it to completion.

My memory is pretty hazy on what happened Wednesday
through Friday. I vaguely remember Dawne
and Jordan getting back from California, and pups being reunited ever so
briefly before I brought Percy to NY. My
parents had their most efficient trip to the JFK yet. They left at 5 am, picked me up at 6,
arriving with barely enough time for Percy to make a pit stop, and then we were
back at in JV by 7:15, which meant I got in a quick nap while the world's
greatest mom made me a ham before Briana, Eva and their adorable sons arrived
for breakfast.

Briana's husband Rob bought their son Austin a book that
was called something like "pigeon takes a bath" but Briana thought
the book was really for her in reference to the fact that she barely showers
anymore.

Eva: Oh! The schools in Brewster are awesome.

Briana: Really.
You should tell Rob that. I think
we're going to move.

Eva: Oh yeah? Where do you want to move?

Briana: California.
But realistically, Mahopac.

Then... I took another nap, way longer than I expected,
but still in time to go down to Sean and Stacey's to decorate eggs. When I arrived, Bailey was grilling her
delicious pizza... which we ate in celebration of her awesome SAT scores. And yes, Sean did make Bailey convert her
score into "old school" score so that us old folks understood how
truly great it was.

Jackie: You know
when Aunt Carla was in high school, she and her friends Sharon and Kristen went
across the street to the A&P to get cookies before track practice. They ate way too many cookies, and then
decided to go sleigh riding down a little hill and Carla ended up twisting her
ankle and one of the friends peed themselves.

Sean: Yeah, well I went to Grandma's Pies with my friends
after the getting inducted into the Honor's Society. On our way back, I got pulled over. But when I told the officer we were full of
pie celebrating out Society of Honor, he let us go.

Jackie: We'll be up at 7 am!

Carla: Wait is that really when we're waking up?

Jackie: Oh Carla.

Jackie: Let's go to mass early because we're up early
anyway and then maybe it'll be shorter.

Carla: 8 am Mass? Yeah.
I'll see you when you get back.

Jackie: It's never too late for mass, Carla.

Me: Do you mean early?

Jackie: I got it, Carla can just make us pancakes and
have them ready for when we get back.

Jackie: You know the other day, the doorbell rang, and
Tim was at the door.

Me: Oh yeah?

Jackie: Yeah, he's going to the formal with Bailey. So when my mom answered the door, we had to
call for her, and when Bailey got to the door... he gave her a big kiss!

Me: Oh yeah!?

That's when Jackie pulled out a big Hershey Kiss

Stacey: Heh. Never
gets old. Remember when Carla worked for
Hiscox.

At one point Sean broke out the glue gun, upping the
Easter egg game big time. Doesn't this
one remind you of a Needler? Or am I just a Halo nerd now?

Plus I made a Jesus Egg.

Bailey: It's a wonder we got done so fast (holding up one
of Jackie's eggs.)

Jackie: So Aunt Michelle found an old video of us singing
Happy Birthday to Katie and one of her parties
The video zooms in and out on Bailey's butt and Michelle became really
concerned because she thought [her husband] Doug was recording. She was pretty relieved when she found out it
was really me.

Jackie: Did Carla say investing for nudes?

Me: No, investing for noobs. Very similar.

After egg decorating we lost ourselves in YouTube videos,
mostly of Jimmy Fallon lip syncing. I
suggested a rad Jimmy Fallon episode of Daniel Radcliff rockin' version of
Alphapet Aerobics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKdV5FvXLuI

Jackie: Dan Radcliffe was found on the street.

Me: What?

Jackie: Oh, he didn't live there, that's just where he
was discovered.

Me: Thanks for the clarification.

Bailey showed me her brand new redecorated room and super
cute formal dress. They were both
awesome, but all I could think of was, Whoa.
Bailey is such an adult.

Morgan: I picture you as Monica from Friends but I see
you as the fat kid version.

Carla: I'm not sure what is more flattering that or when
I was called Olaf.

Don't worry, I found my basket on Sunday morning. My mom was definitely not pleased that I
dressed Percy up as a rabbit and then fed him rabbit. Whoops.

Patrick was an altar boy at Easter mass. I'm not sure if taking pictures at church is
cool or not, but I took A LOT of my nephew.
So proud!

Seton was really packed so they had another mass in the
school gym. And that mass, got out like
ten minutes before ours did, which is when my sister leaned over and said,
"They won."

Jackie: On our way back from church we saw fire trucks
going up the road so I yelled, "Oh no! Carla was making us
breakfast!"

[Don't worry, it wasn't on its way to Sean's house.]

The Egg Hunt 2015

Bailey and Jackie opened all of the crazy Archie McPhee
presents which was a big hit. Here are
some of the quotes from the opening.

Jackie: Who needs adult diapers when you have instant
underpants: just add water. I'm
definitely going to use these one day.

Jackie: She always has to sit on the same chair as me
even if there is one right next to me.

Morgan: That’s because you never let me use the computer
or the remote.

Jackie: I change the channel when you need me to.

Morgan: But you don’t let me do it myself!

Jackie: I just like to control everything okay?"

Mr. Larsen’s pup Giz (brother of Sean’s dog Suki) joined
us for Easter weekend. It was the first
time I had met this little guy, and he was so sweet and chill. I’m so glad I did get to snuggle with him for
a bit because since he unexpected died. Super super sad and not just
a little bit shocking.

Giz:

And his bro Suki:

And Bella, who is apparently also a lap dog:

Stacey made an amazing dinner, hanging out with the fam
was amazing as always. The next day, my
parents took me and the boys (my nephews + Percy) to Bear Mountain to run
around a little bit. After that, we
headed over to King Buffet and I got to find out what all the fuss was
about. It was just a perfect
pre-birthday day that was really all about me.
Then, sadly, it was time to head back to the PNW.

I saw this at the airport and thought it amusing,
especially “even if it has no value” paired with the super old cell phone.

I called Dawne on my way home from work on Monday and
interrupted her day at Disney. Of course!
Where else would she be on a Monday evening.
:) She was concerned that Diana
hadn't picked up the phone earlier and asked if I knew how she was doing. Seeing as I had spent the weekend vegging out
with Zach for the most part and ignoring all real responsibilities, I had no
idea what was going on with her. I fixed
that by picking up some ice creaming and dropping in unexpectedly - what
everyone loves!

Me: I heard you were having a bad day so I brought ice
cream.

Jason: I'm having a bad day.

Me: IT'S NOT FOR YOU!

I'm glad I barged in though, because that meant that I
found out Diana wanted to join us for the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival with us
the next day. Tuesday, I picked Diana,
Percy, Kelly and some snacks up for our trip to Mt. Vernon. As we were pulling off the highway...

Diana: Did you get a map or should we stop and get one?

Kelly: No.

Diana: No?

Kelly: I'm my own bloom map

Kelly: Actually, I could use a bathroom.

Diana: There's a bathroom at the visitor's center... with
the maps!

Kelly: Everyone freaking love's reflection shots.

I don't know what they put these crates all around for,
but I can only imagine it was as a prop for Percy. Diana had the swell idea to wear bright
colors, meanwhile Kelly was all, "Grey or Black?" I also brought treats and toys for
Percy. I brought one toy that was
mediocre on Percy's list because I thought it would get his attention without
causing too much excitement. Neither the
toy nor the treats really worked.
Finally, brought out the big guns, his duck. He went gonzo. I gave Kelly the duck to hold onto and when
we got out at the next field (did I mention that none of the field allow dogs?)
and Percy is whimpering because he knows that she has it. That's when she started squeaking the duck
whilst 30 feet ahead of me causing Percy to bark. I countered by letting go over Percy all
together and let Kelly try to take pictures with Percy jumping all over
her. YW.

On Wednesday, Diana and I found out that Jimmy John's
will deliver right to the inside of the cancer center of the hospital. How convenient - and less upsetting to those
around us than say... having Indian food delivered. I also learned that despite how many people
go through chemo treatment, and how ever many questions one might ask, there
are always new things that you find out.
For example, Diana learned that if she eats candy and covers her nose
with perfumed fabric, the gross effects of the medicine being injected at the
beginning and end of treatment is mitigated.
Every time she figures something out, my first reaction is "why
didn't anyone tell you this before!?" but then I force myself to get some
perspective and I'm just happy that she figured it out.

On feel like maybe Friday I spent trying to catch up on
these updates and then ended up getting distracted instead. Weird.
Saturday, Zach and I headed over to Dr. Rach & Ander's for
brunch. Anders made some kind of
quiche/casserole thing that was DE-LISH (and made me feel like maybe we didn't
need croissants AND top pot donuts before that.) Lauren and Sheryl joined us
with their adorable baby. They were
talking about looking for a new part time nanny, and Anders and Rach said they
should also see if whoever they found would be up for also watching their
baby. This is when Zach started
laughing.

Lauren: What?

Zach: I'm just
imagining you being very shady when you're describing what you need.
"Right so there might be a second baby.
It's not ours. We're not
sure. Don't ask questions. I mean who knows if we'll even pull this
acquisition off."

And, I took a video of Henley intensely staring at Zach
holding Percy. Zach accentuated the
situation by moving around so you could see her little head moving back and
forth.

Then we were talking about TV, and one show (Super
tripper? That can't be right...) was something that some of us were not
familiar with.

Anders: [I watch it] Sometimes. It's on too late

Me: So now you're too old?

Anders: I only watch Columbo and Mattock.

Dr. Rach: And Murder She Wrote.

After brunch, we went to Archie McPhees to get my nieces
birthday presents.

Zach: Tiffany! Who does this remind you of?

Me (laughing): I don't know!

Zach: Come on!

Rach: We know someone that this would remind us of?

Zach: It's SO obvious!!

(Well it wasn’t to us… J )

Anders (on the answering machine in stock): Oh! I need
one of those. I'll connect it to my
iPhone.

After Archies, we walked around Greenlake where I
regularly had to remind Percy that it's okay for people to run, even though
he's never seen me run. We ended up
coming home from the jaunt and taking a quick nap, because watching people run
is exhausting.

Later that evening, Kelly, Matty, Hannah, Dr. Rach and I
headed over to the Bemis Building for Mary's art show. This building is wild, man. It's a bunch of artist's lofts that people
both work and live in. When they have a
show, like on Saturday, people display their work on the walls (like Mary did)
but also open their homes to people to look at their art on their own
walls. Pretty special, right? I didn't take pictures of Mary's pictures,
b/c that's a little weird, but I did take a picture of Mary and Mukul walking
past her photography.

We stopped by one loft, and there was some Monkey Bowl
punch (can someone from college please email me at let me know what we used to
call this hodge podge beverage at Penn State? Thanks!) A gentleman offered us
beverages, which Dr. Rach declined.

Dr. Rach: No thank you. I'm Pregnant.

Gent: Are you sure?

Dr. Rach: That I'm pregnant. Yes, quite sure.

Then we wandered into another loft where photography was
happening, and the only real quote I have here is, "Look at the light,
don't go to the light."

The following morning, I received a call from my
brother. Sean said, "I need you to
apply for your birthday present. I
promise it isn't for an army T-shirt or a mortgage." The rest of Sunday was filled with a walk at
Marymoor, followed by Tristan making us lunch.
While he was expressing his culinary skills, we also played some board
games. After a big bowl of pasta, Kelly
made the brilliant suggestion that we move ourselves over to the coach to lay
down. She legitimately took a nap, and
Zach and I watched more of "Turn" and Tristan hung out with Kelly's
dog Piper.

Friday, April 3, 2015

Monday night Nater and I enjoyed
some fine corned beef made by me, in my brand spanking new slow cooker. And then I spent a couple of hours baking green
coffee cake and green dessert (both concoctions were new, and both were amazing
– but I’m afraid to tell you what they are and then have Martha Stewart or
Betty Crocker swipe my great ideas like the whole “Brookie” incident.

Tuesday night I made a call out
to my local friends to see if anyone would brave the wilds (Wildes?”) of an
Irish bar in Redmond with my “crew” – AKA Nater, Zach, Tristan, Becky and
Kelly. Zach mocked my Irish heritage on
facebook earlier in the day, so I made him do an Irish Car Bomb,
Naturally.

Becky was very festive with her
contribution of Green Peeps (which might have actually been her dinner?)

Becky: It must be nice to have
such a great metabolism.

Tristan: No, I just work out a
lot.

Tristan: You know, when I went
to visit tigers, the tiger handler was missing an arm.

Nater: How does a stork deliver
a tiger baby? You think that would get eaten.

Becky: It’s like telling someone
that I had a pet raccoon, cat and pig and then have them guess which one isn’t
true.
Tristan: The Raccoon right?

Becky: No I gave you three
truths.

Me: Haha Nater, can you text me:
I just gave you three truths a cat a raccoon and a pig.

Becky: That’s not what I said,
but I like hearing the way to tell it anyway.

Unfortunately, I forgot my phone
for this outing so I asked ppl to text me when someone said something funny and
now I have no idea what they mean.

We were talking about greetings,
hugs and touching people’s backs and the difference between an innocent touch
and a WHOA buddy. I don’t remember who
said this but it’s funny, so I’ll assume Nater.

Nater: I just stick to touching
bathing suit areas because I like to touch people where they have the most
clothing.

Zach: We should make a TV show
where the cities are made of cards.

Nater: And the whole premise is
Toddlers crushing those cities like Godzilla.

Trisan: There are 9 kids in my
family.

Me: Whoa! Did they all live in
the trailer!?

Tristan: No.

Okay so this is when he told us the
complicated tale of his family tree, around 5 times until I got it
straight. And I couldn’t only get it
straight by using me hands to remember which we’re his mom’s kids and which
were his dad’s kids using the thumbs on each hand for Tristan and his brother
who shared the same mom and dad. I’ll
have to show it to you some time because if I took picture it would just look
like I only know how to count to 9.

On Wednesday, we (Cassidy,
Nater, Zach, Kelly and I) met at Moxie’s to playtest Zach’s game. The cards are looking pretty awesome, and I
had fun – though I’m not sure Zach loved our “help” but it’s always nice
playing with friends. Thursday was my
third evening out on a school night.
Cray Cray. I met up for happy
hour in Seattle with Alicia, Greg, Rollie, Kelly, Maggie, Hannah and
Shana. I was a little late because of
traffic.

Shana: This place is Percy
friendly.

Me: Really?! Wait, how did you
know I had him with me?

I know – dumb question.

Shana: I saw the most hilarious
response to someone dying on facebook, all thanks to autocorrect and now I want
to use it all the time. “Rene, Osprey for your loss.”

20 minutes later

Alicia: My dog sitter is
leaving, so I have to find a new one.

Kelly: Rene, Osprey for your
loss.

Alicia went to Mexico with Greg,
and Shana got her this shirt:

Which is appropriate because
Alicia had some unfortunate digestive issues that required a stool sample to be
taken to the doctor.

Shana: That is some big time
boyfriend duty.

Kelly: Some boyfriends will hold
a purse…

Rollie (upon his return from the
restroom): There are orange slices in the urinal! My mother always told me to
not waste food… so I ate it.

After that party died down,
Kelly, Maggie, Hannah and I headed over to Shorty’s so that Kelly could get
some photography on. Percy wasn’t
opposed to this concept.

On Friday, I was walking back
from SBUX when I saw this mama and her pup snoozing while they waited for their
human.

Saw this driver in front of me on
my way home, and yes, we were close to the Microsoft studios.

On Saturday, Zach woke me up at
8 to tell me something about a car and the dealership and AAA. I told him I would call back in 30 minutes
when I was “awake.” I texted him to say
that I was going to swing by SBUX and that I would meet him at the
dealership. This is when he got very
frustrated with me and my inability to comprehend anything in the morning. Apparently, he got a flat tire the night
before, put a donut on, but the car wouldn’t go over 27 MPH. I drove over to his apartment and he told me
that he had called AAA, but because it wasn’t an urgent matter, they wouldn’t
be there until 12:30. This is when I
wanted to go home, but Zach wanted to hang out, to which I said, “but you don’t
have coffee in there!” He placated me
with a Hershey bar for breakfast.

After we finally got the car
where it was supposed to be, we picked up food and Tristan made us gourmet
burgers. Mid-cook, Tristan asked Zach to
pour beer into his mouth. Something is
not right here.

Yup, still not quite making
it.

Tristan: Go ahead and eat.

Me: No, you cooked us lunch, the
least we could do is wait for you.

Zach (with a mouth full of
burger): Yeah, I would never.

I went home after that to write
out my Easter cards, and then showered and went back to Zach’s for a nice
evening stroll followed by binge watching the Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. I’m not sure, but I think I ended up going
for a walk to the dog park with Zach and then more Kimmy on Sunday – with only
a smattering of all the errands I needed to do in between. This is how I get so behind!